


sibling rivalry

by happyrobins



Series: baby!Damian AU [7]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Blood and Injury, Brotherly Bonding, Family Fluff, Gen, Major Illness, Natural Disasters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-03-27
Packaged: 2018-05-22 07:55:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6071242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happyrobins/pseuds/happyrobins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>scenes of Tim and smol bratty Damian in a baby!Damian AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Why does he have to stay with us?” Damian demands, his little nose wrinkled in displeasure. Alfred is helping Tim unpack in the bedroom beside his, and the sounds of drawers opening and furniture shifting can be heard clearly through the wall, much too close.

He had plans—now ruined—for that bedroom to be his second toy room. The first one is getting too full.

Sighing quietly, Bruce sits down next to Damian on the racecar bed, which Damian takes as an opportunity to climb onto his father’s lap and hold onto him tightly. “There was an accident,” explains Bruce. “His mother is gone, and his father is in the hospital and won’t be able to take care of him for a long time. He needs us.”

Damian looks up. “He’s alone, like Jason was?”

“For now, until his father is well again,” says Bruce. He meets Damian’s eyes seriously. “You need to be nice to Tim. He’s our guest. Can I trust you to do that?”

Damian grumbles something unhappily against his father’s shoulder.

“Damian,” Bruce says sternly.

“Okay,” he agrees reluctantly. Then: “I will if I can have a pony. One with spots.”

Bruce thinks about it for a moment. He should say no. Bargaining with his young son for good behaviour only proves the gossip mill right about his skills as a father. But none of his critics, or the authors of the many parenting books he’s consulted, have encountered a child like Damian. “We’ll see.”

 

* * *

Damian doesn’t mean to fall asleep in his father’s big leather chair in front of the Batcomputer. He never does, when he climbs up into it to sit and listen to the bats, or to press buttons on the glowing keyboard and pretend he’s doing important computer work. But the chair is so comfortable and safe, like its owner, that he always ends up yawning and curled up on the seat, feeling like he’s being held securely in his father’s arms.

During this particular nap he’s stirred half-awake by the sense of someone watching him. He squints blearily at the dark-haired boy standing beside the chair. “Jay?” he murmurs. The boy doesn’t say anything. Then Damian is engulfed with a feeling of soft warmth, and drifts back to sleep.

It could have been a dream, if not for the cape Damian finds draped over him when he wakes up. Yellow and _black_. Not Jason’s. Jason is gone.

He throws the offending garment off of him and lets it fall to the floor.

 

* * *

“Father!” Damian shouts, sprinting down the stone stairs to the cave in his footie dragon pyjamas. He artfully dodges Alfred’s grab and runs to the parked Batmobile, face flushed and eyes wide with worry as he sees the blood, the charred and slashed uniforms. “Dick! You’re—“

“Fine. We’re fine,” Bruce is quick to assure him. He pulls off his cowl and forces a smile through his pained grimace.

“Thanks to Tim,” adds Dick. Damian, clinging to Dick’s leg, stares up at Tim with a look that isn’t hostile, for once. It could almost, almost be something near admiration. “He saved us. We’re lucky to have him around.”

Tim understands what Dick is doing, and he’s grateful. He doesn’t receive a hug from Damian like the others before the boy is shepherded off to bed, but the look on Damian’s face was enough. Something has shifted between them, the glacial grudge Damian has been holding against him since they met has melted the tiniest bit. It’s progress.

 

* * *

 

“Are you sure this is a game your dad would be okay with?” Tim asks, looking worriedly at the strewn papers covered with crayon drawings of superheroes and detailed, illustrated, step-by-step contingency plans to defeat them. Most of these heroes are members of the Justice League, Bruce’s friends, some of them practically Damian’s extended family.

“He does it too,” says Damian unconcernedly, grabbing a green crayon and a fresh sheet of paper. He looks at Tim expectantly. “Green Lantern.”

“Weaknesses? Um.” Tim pretends to think, using the time to continue his inner moral debate. But, he supposes he can sacrifice his morals if it means getting Damian to like him. “Fear is the big one, it makes it hard for them to use their rings. And the colour yellow negates green ring energy.”

Damian nods decisively and scribbles away. “I can paint myself yellow and beat him up.”

“Sure. Or use fear gas. There’s lots of samples in the cave.”

He notes that down. “You’re good at this,” he says, and coming from him that’s glowing praise. “Now Wonder Woman.”

 

* * *

Damian lingers in the doorway like a little scowling thundercloud, watching Tim pack up his belongings.

Everyone else was happy for Tim when they heard his dad was finally getting out of the hospital, but Damian has been deeply upset since he found out, like he was hoping Tim’s dad would never get better. Tim doesn’t know whether to be flattered or concerned.

“Why are you leaving?” Damian asks as Tim zips the last suitcase shut.

“I told you. My dad’s being released from the hospital and I’m moving back in with him.”

“But _why_?” demands Damian, crossing his arms angrily. “I was nice to you, like Father told me. I tried.”

“You were,” Tim assures him. It’s true, he has been nice. Just… not at the beginning. “I’m not going because of anything you did. Me staying here was only temporary.”

“Jason left, too. And Dick is gone most of the time. You all leave.”

For a long, aching moment, Tim doesn’t know what to say. He reaches out to Damian only for the boy to take a step back, away from him, guarded as a feral cat. “I won’t be very far, Damian,” Tim tries to explain. “And I’m still Robin, so I’ll be down in the cave all the time. You won’t even miss me.”

“I wouldn’t anyway,” Damian says indignantly, but he’s betrayed by the loud sniffle he can’t hold back. He turns on his heel and runs away before Tim can stop him.

 

* * *

 

Damian listened patiently to all of Alfred’s reasons why he mustn’t go down into the cave. He made promises that he wouldn’t try to sneak into it, that he would stay up in the house and go to sleep. But none of that matters. His family always does everything they can to help other people, no matter the danger, so Damian can’t just let Tim lay sick and hurt in the cave without trying to help him. 

The worst Damian ever got sick was when he had the flu and had to stay in bed. Everyone was worried a lot and Alfred made him soup and Dick watched cartoons with him. He expects Tim has something like the flu.

He’s very wrong.

Tim is lying in a bed surrounded by softly beeping machines, his shaking arms curled up against his chest. A bandage is wrapped across his eyes like a blindfold. Damian doesn’t like it. He climbs up onto the bed and gently peels it away from Tim’s face. It takes a moment for Tim to open his glazed, bloodshot eyes, and a moment longer for them to focus on the boy perched next to him.

“Damian…” he rasps. It’s all he can say before his eyes close again. Damian doesn’t understand why Alfred hasn’t fixed Tim yet. Alfred can fix anyone.

“Hi,” says Damian, suddenly overcome by an emotion that he doesn’t feel often, one that reminds him of the nights his father doesn’t come home on time. Fear. He’s afraid. 

“Master Damian!” Alfred shouts in horror, rushing over and hauling Damian away from Tim and out of the cave.

Everything is a panicked blur after that. Alfred forces Damian to stay in bed and checks his temperature every ten minutes, hands shaking so much he can barely hold the thermometer. He doesn’t even scold Damian for breaking his promise and going down to the cave. Damian wishes he would. He wants Alfred to act _normal_  again.

“Am I going to die?” asks Damian, having snuck away from bed to eavesdrop on Alfred having another worried, whispered conversation with Dick and Bruce over the phone, and regrets it when he sees Alfred’s devastated face. He doesn’t understand—he feels fine.

Dick comes back after dawn, his face streaked with dirt and tears, and Damian has to have a shot, which he’s not happy about. He is hugged a lot and has to push Dick away so he doesn’t get cried on and then he finally, finally gets to see Tim again.

His eyes are still red but there are no bandages, and he’s sitting in Bruce’s chair, wrapped in a blanket and smiling. Damian is relieved that Alfred finally got around to making him better. He _knew_  Alfred could fix anyone.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” says Tim, which Damian thinks is silly. _Tim_  was the sick one, after all.

 

* * *

 

Tim’s first thought upon laying eyes on the Manor is that nobody could have survived. The wreck of a building in front of him is even worse than anything he saw in the city. It’s _gutted_ , sunken into the cave below, with a gaping pit where the house should be.

“Dick,” he says, reaching out, but Dick is already running to the crumbling ruins, heedless of danger.

What’s left of the building is still unstable. Tim has to pick his way carefully as he climbs down after Dick to avoid getting caught in sliding mud and debris. The Batcave is as broken as the rest of the Manor, crushed by the house’s foundation. Dick has rushed too far ahead now and Tim stumbles over the piles of rubble in his hurry to catch up.

He reaches an intact platform and his heart lifts when he sees Alfred standing there in one piece. And then it plummets at the sight of Dick kneeling and clinging to a small body, his shoulders shaking uncontrollably. The air around Tim seems to turn cold, too cold for his lungs, numbing him beyond all feeling.

“Enough!” says Damian, trying to squirm free, and Dick finally relents, laughing. Damian’s eyes are wide in his dirt-smudged face. One of his arms is wrapped in a sling. He’s alive, and for the moment Tim can breathe again.

 

* * *

 

The computer is nothing but shattered glass and circuits crushed by rock, but they debrief by it anyway, out of habit. Bruce doesn’t even take his cowl off. He’s been out in the city all day, helping people evacuate, and he’ll be heading straight back there as soon as possible. 

There’s so much work to do—weeks and months and maybe even _years_  of work to bring Gotham back to life. So it doesn’t come as a surprise when he says, hoarsely, “I’m going to send Damian away.”

“He’ll stay with me in Bludhaven,” Dick offers instantly. “I’ll make it work.”

Bruce shakes his head. “He needs to be farther away from Gotham. From… all of this. Somewhere safer, more stable.” Dick tries to argue his case, but Bruce cuts him off with a tone that means he’s already made his decision. “I’m sending him to Kansas. The Kents have agreed to take care of him for a while. I think he’ll be happy there, spending time with the animals on the farm.”

“You’re wrong,” says Tim. “He won’t be.”

It’s a nice thought, Damian being safe and happy on a peaceful farm, learning how to be a carefree child. Nice because it’s false. Damian will never be happy without his family, he will never be carefree, and he will never forgive them for sending him so far away. 

He will never forgive _any_  of them. He makes that very clear when he screams it at them after Bruce tells him what’s going to happen. Damian has outgrown tantrums, but he hasn’t outgrown yelling, and he argues himself hoarse against Bruce’s stone-carved ultimatum. A tantrum would be preferable, Tim thinks. When Damian was younger he would yell and cry. He doesn’t cry anymore—instead his eyes are hard and burning with anger.

That scowl doesn’t leave his face, even as he departs the next day. The last Tim sees of him is his resentful glare through the car window as Alfred drives him away from his home.

It will be a long time before they see each other again.


	2. Chapter 2

Despite the bleak warzone that is No Man’s Land, and his guilt over worrying his dad sick by getting himself trapped in a restricted area, Tim is glad to be back where he belongs. Robin’s job is to protect Gotham. He can’t in good conscience stay away from the city during its time of greatest need.

He meets up with Dick on the tallest building still standing on the East side. The sun hasn’t even set yet and Dick has already gotten into a fight or several—brutal ones, judging by his sorry state. A cut is bleeding through the slashed arm of his uniform and he has a fresh bruise below his mask.

“Damian’s gone,” Dick says in lieu of greeting, in a voice as desolate as the ruined city around them.

Tim takes a second to process that. “What? Where is he?”

“Clark told me that a helicopter full of League of Assassins agents landed on the Kents’ farm. They took Damian.” Blood trickles from a cut at the corner of Dick’s mouth and he wipes at it absently. “The Kents are fine. Talia ordered her lackeys not to hurt them.”

“Damian’s with her,” Tim breathes. He doesn’t have much experience with the woman, but this doesn’t sound good. “Are we going to do something about this? Does Bruce know?”

Dick grimaces angrily. “He’s known longer than I have. He said he’s spoken to Talia and that we should leave it alone.”

Tim is suddenly relieved it took him so long to get into No Man’s Land. He must have missed one hell of a blowout between those two. No wonder Dick is out here letting off steam and getting himself beat up.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” says Tim, trying to assure both Dick and himself. “Talia’s his mom. She wouldn’t hurt him.”

“Tim, he’s surrounded by _assassins_ ,” Dick says bitterly. “The only reason I agreed to send Damian to the Kents instead of taking him with me to Bludhaven is because Bruce said he would be _safe_. And now he’s letting Damian live with killers-for-hire. He didn’t even tell me.”

Tim puts a hand on his shoulder. “If you want to go get Damian, I’m with you. We can leave right now.”

Dick looks over, and he’s seriously considering it. It’s an impossible decision. Going to Damian would mean leaving Bruce and the city behind when their help is needed the most. If they abandon their duties here, there is no question that more people will die. 

Eventually, Dick sighs in regret, his breath a puff of white mist in the cold air. “Bruce promised I would get to talk to him tomorrow. He’s going to set up a video link.” But he looks at Tim gratefully and adds, “We’ll see.”

“He’s fine. I know it,” Tim repeats, the words hollow. The only way he can help right now is by finding some brawls Dick can get lost in enough to stop thinking about Damian, even for a few seconds at a time.

 

* * *

 

Damian holds his mother’s hand as they walk through her garden. It’s the most beautiful place he’s ever been, more lush and alive than the gardens at the Manor, full of birds and snakes tame enough to hold. He’s had dreams like this, of being with his mother in this garden. He wonders if he truly hasn’t seen it before. 

Talia looks down at him, smiling serenely. “Tell me of your dreams, darling. What do you want to be?”

In Damian’s dreams of being with his mother in this place, he feels only happy and safe. That’s how he knows this isn’t a dream—he _aches_. His body aches all over from the physically demanding lessons his mother insists he take daily, and his heart aches for the family he hasn’t seen in two months, the family that sent him away. He should hate them, but he misses them too much for that.

“I want to be Robin,” he says decisively, raising his chin. Despite his family’s betrayal, that hasn’t changed. In that moment, with that answer, he realizes he may be able to forgive them someday. It’s not impossible as he once thought.

Talia raises an elegant brow. “A sidekick? Truly?”

“Yes. So I can be by my father’s side. And then when he is old I’ll be Batman and protect Gotham.”

“How noble. Why just Gotham City? You could have the entire world, if you wanted.”

“I can’t look after the whole world.”

She kneels and looks him in the eyes with such serious intensity that it is difficult to meet her gaze, but he doesn’t dare show weakness by looking away. “You can do anything, Damian,” she says firmly.

“I just want to be Robin.”

“It is an admirable goal, for now,” she says after a moment’s thought, and Damian glows with pride. Her praise might as well be handed down from the gods. His mother is perfect, and beautiful, and strong. Even more than he could have imagined. He would do anything to please her. “How do you plan to deal with those standing in your way?”

He frowns, confused. “What?”

“Timothy Drake, the current and unworthy Robin. He lays claim to the role that you rightfully deserve.”

“I can be Robin after he stops, like Dick stopped.”

“But who is to say when that will be? Your dear Richard became Robin when he was not much older than you are now. If you wait too long for your turn, your father may deem you too old to be trained for the role.”

“He wouldn’t!” Damian protests loudly. “Jason— and Tim, they were—“ She cuts him off with a disapproving frown and a hand brushed gently across his cheek, and he flushes in shame at his undignified outburst.

“Keep it in mind, dearest. We cannot stand by and wait for the things we wish, we must make them happen ourselves.” She kisses him on the forehead and rises. “Now, I should like to see the improvement you’ve made with the throwing knives this week. Tell your instructor to set up the targets.”

Damian’s sore arms may protest the idea, but his heart leaps with the chance to impress her. All his doubts and confusion over her words are pushed aside, for the moment. “Yes, Mother.”

 

* * *

 

Damian is different when he returns to Gotham. 

He’s older, for one thing. It shouldn’t be a surprise, yet Tim had underestimated _how much_  older he would be. Dick shrugs when Tim mentions it and says that kids grow up fast around Damian’s age, but Tim doesn’t miss the pain and regret in his eyes when he looks at the boy who used to hug him back.

A lot has happened since Damian left. The removal of military blockades to reopen Gotham, the rebuilding of the city and the Manor, Bruce’s murder charge and time on the lam—perhaps it was best that he missed most of it. And one look at Damian’s face is enough to tell them that plenty has happened to him, as well. Plenty of things that they missed and he won’t speak of.

The first thing Damian does upon arriving home is toss all of his toys out of his room. Even his beloved stuffed animals. Tim sees Alfred stop beside the sad, abandoned pile of animals outside Damian’s closed door and pick up a small stuffed elephant that had once had its ear torn off. Damian had been inconsolable until Alfred sewed it back on.

Dick and Alfred fret over Damian’s silence about the time he spent with his mother, and the hard shell he has created around himself. Bruce re-enrols Damian in school in an attempt to steer him towards normalcy and argues with him about the knives he brought with him from Talia’s. Tim spends less time at the Manor.

Before, Damian was tough to get along with. Now he’s impossible. Tim feels like he’s starting from scratch—things that once granted him favour with Damian are now scoffed at. Piggyback rides are childish, games are a waste of time, and Damian doesn’t want to _pretend_  heroes, he wants to _be_  one. Damian has uprooted any camaraderie that’s grown between them and salted the earth so it never will again.

Eventually Damian thaws a bit towards Dick and Alfred. He’s still not the same as before, but it’s enough to make Alfred stop looking into therapists. And, later still, he starts to forgive and open up to Bruce. When it comes to Tim, however, Damian doesn’t budge an inch. He doesn’t call Tim by his first name anymore, and he refuses to spend more than five minutes in the same room as him. Tim, swamped with enough problems at school and home, finds it simplest to cut his time at the Manor even shorter.

He just wishes to know what he’d done to make Damian hate him so much.

  

* * *

 

 

Damian sits unnoticed on the stairs leading to the cave, watching the argument unfold below. He’s already decided that he dislikes Tim’s father greatly. How dare this unpleasant, twitchy man _shout_  at his father and call him names? Damian’s father is the greatest of heroes—this man doesn’t even deserve to be in his presence. 

His father could break any number of the man’s bones in the blink of an eye, and yet he silently and patiently puts up with the insults and verbal abuse and accusatory finger jabbing, not even defending himself. Damian doesn’t understand it.

“You’re sick, Wayne,” the man is snarling, red-faced. “What kind of man puts children in the line of fire? My son could have _died_! Would you have even cared, or would you just put another boy in that costume?” His gaze falls on Damian by chance and he gestures at the boy, telling Bruce coldly, “I see you already have a replacement all lined up. How many more are you hiding in this cave?”

“Dad,” says Tim, stepping in front of him. “Leave Damian out of this.” Tim’s father blinks at the authority in his son’s voice, momentarily stunned, and Tim takes the opportunity to drag him to another part of the cave to speak privately.

Meanwhile, Bruce tries to convince Damian to go upstairs but he shakes his head stubbornly and clings tightly to his father’s cape like he hasn’t done since he was six. Earlier he heard Bruce talking to Alfred about exposed identities and contingency plans, and now he’s worried. He needs to know what is going to happen.

When Tim returns and states that he will be resigning as Robin, Damian can’t believe what he’s hearing. This is the moment he’s been hoping for. Drake is no longer in his way, the role of Robin is within Damian’s grasp, all he needs to do is convince his father…

But this is wrong. This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. Tim can’t just _quit_  and deprive Damian of the right to challenge him for the title. Damian deserves to prove his worthiness by defeating his rival, as is proper.

“You can’t go,” Damian blurts out as Tim is walking away. The other boy stops and turns, surprised but smiling. It’s the most civil thing Damian has said to him in a long time.

“Don’t worry, I’ll still see you around,” he assures Damian. “Just… not here.”

Damian scowls in frustration. Tim is misunderstanding him. “But—“

“Tim,” the elder Drake interrupts, waiting impatiently by the stairs.

“Bye, Damian.” Tim swiftly reaches out and squeezes Damian’s shoulder, smiling at him once more, and then follows.


	3. Chapter 3

“Drake,” says a petulant voice when Tim answers his ringing phone.

“Damian?” Tim asks in surprise. Why would Damian be calling him at home? His thoughts quickly jump to the worst possible scenarios. “Are you okay? Is something wrong?”

“I need to talk to you.”

Tim sighs and slips into his bedroom, lowering his voice to just above a whisper. It’s been three weeks since he quit being Robin, and his dad still worries every time he gets a phone call or leaves the house, like Tim might break his word at any opportunity and put on a cape again. “This isn’t a good time. I can’t really—“

“Shut up. Listen.”

“I’ll call you back—“

“Drake!” exclaims Damian irritably, loudly enough to make Tim wince and yank the phone away from his ear. He still doesn’t understand why Damian refuses to call him by his first name. “You must return _immediately_  and resume being Robin.”

“I can’t. I’m sorry, but I made my decision and I’m not changing it.”

“Father is training a new Robin.”

Tim sits on the edge of his bed, crinkling the homework papers scattered across the mattress, and rubs at his forehead tiredly. “Yeah, I know. Steph.” He found out the day before. It’s still a sore subject. People move on, he guesses, but he didn’t expect it to happen so soon, or to leave him so alone.

Damian is even unhappier than he is, if that’s possible. “I hate her,” the boy declares. Tim can imagine the way Damian’s nose wrinkles as he says it. “You must return so that Father will send her away.”

Flopping back on his bed, Tim takes a moment to wonder if Damian hates her for replacing him, or because she’s taking the role Damian sees as his own. Either way, it doesn’t matter—Damian has made his judgement, and Steph is going to suffer unless Tim can talk him out of it.

“You liked Steph when she used to help me babysit you, remember?” he reminds Damian, a faint smile crossing his face as he recalls happier times. “Just… give her a chance. Be nice to her.”

Damian is quiet for a long moment. “I don’t take orders from you,” he says, hanging up with a loud slam. Tim stares at the ceiling—a new hobby thanks to the ample time he now has on his hands—then dials Stephanie to warn her.

 

* * *

 

Damian finally manages to track Tim down to a utility room in the east wing, hunkered behind the water heater in the dark with his laptop. It's a good hiding place, but Damian has been exploring every nook and cranny of this house since he learned how to walk.

“Why are you avoiding me?”

Tim stares at him with red-rimmed eyes, uncomprehending. “What?”

“You’re Robin again. Everything is like it was before. But you don’t talk to me, you hardly leave the cave when you’re here, and now Alfred says you’re _going away_?” Damian asks incredulously. He can't believe this behaviour. It's just rudeness, after everything he and his family has done for Tim. “Were you even going to say goodbye to me?”

Tim doesn't even have the decency to look apologetic. “Not everything is about you, Damian," he says, his voice tired but sharp with anger. He stands, tucking his laptop under his arm, off to find another hiding place like the coward he is. At the doorway, he turns around with a scowl and says, “And, no, things are _not_ like they were before. My dad is dead. Nothing is ever going to be the same. Now, I’d appreciate it if you would _leave me alone_ so I can try to deal with the fact.”

Damian follows after him stubbornly. As if he would let Drake get the last word. “Your uncle isn’t real. The one you’re going to live with. I know; I checked.” That stops Tim in his tracks. Damian points an accusing finger at Tim, who looks down at him coolly. “It’s all lies. Why are you _lying_?”

“I’m acting in the best interests of me and everyone else. I know you know that Bruce offered to adopt me. Well, I’m doing us both a favour and making sure that doesn’t happen." Tim laughs, dry and humourless. "It’s not like I need another reason for you to hate me.”

This time Damian doesn't follow as Tim walks away and shuts himself behind a slammed door. The sound seems to ring in the empty hallway for a long time.

“I don’t hate you,” says Damian, but nobody is there to hear.

 

* * *

 

It takes time for Tim to realize it, but he’s grateful to Bruce for taking them on this trip. Leaving Gotham doesn't make the crisis and everything that led up to it go away. Nothing will. But it's given him the space and freedom he needs to think.

He stands on another hotel balcony in another city, looking out at the darkening sky in contemplation. Arms crossed on the railing, he thinks about all the people he's lost in these past months and how many more he might lose in the future. If his time with the people he cares about can be so suddenly cut short, he shouldn't waste any of it.

Tim turns and returns to the expansive hotel suite. Damian is sitting upside-down on the couch, his nose stuck in the same book on criminology he’s been reading since Dick and Bruce went out into the city. 

Things have been awkward between them for a long time. It’s been getting better, with the time they’ve spent together on this trip, but Tim misses the way things were.

Tim stands in the doorway and looks around the suite’s sitting room appraisingly. “You know,” he tells Damian, “If we move the furniture, I bet we could make enough room to practice fighting with staffs. I have an extra you can use.” 

Damian gives him a measuring look, the faintest of smiles crossing his face, and puts down his book.

It’s a bit embarrassing, later, to explain the broken lamp and table to Bruce.

* * *

 

When Damian was younger and Tim was living with them he used to worry, and then hope, and then worry again that his father would adopt Tim like he did with Jason, and Dick. Now that it’s happened, Damian finds that he doesn’t mind too much. Nothing really changes.

And besides, he knows his father will always love him best.

The Manor doesn’t seem so empty anymore, now that Tim is living with them again. Even back in the earliest days, when Tim first stayed with them and Damian _hated_ him, he secretly liked having Tim around for that reason. He didn’t change the fact that Jason was gone, but he had made it a little easier to ignore the empty space the other boy had left, sometimes.

There is something _not right_ about Tim, though. Damian can tell. He doesn’t know what to do about it, so he just keeps a close eye on his new brother.

Tim smiles a lot, but his eyes are sad and distant. And tired. He never seems to _stop_. He spends more nights than ever as Robin, going out solo when Bruce doesn’t need him and flying off to the Teen Titans at every possible opportunity, and he still finds enough time every day to bother Damian by trying to help him with his homework, or driving him to school.

This particular morning, he stops in front of the school but reaches over and grabs Damian’s shoulder to stop him leaving the car. Tim takes a deep breath that hitches just slightly and says in a rush, "Damian, I know things have been rough the past couple years, especially between us. And there's a lot I'm sorry about. A lot of things I said that—" 

"None of that matters now,” Damian insists. He looks away, out the window, avoiding Tim’s eyes. If anyone should be apologizing, it’s him. He’d rather they both just forget it.

"I just want you to know that I won't leave again. I promise. We're brothers, and that means we've got to stick together. Okay?” Tim’s face is pale and nearly gaunt from exhaustion, with dark smudges like bruises under his eyes. His hopeful smile looks ready to break.

Damian nods. "I understand,” he says. It’s enough for Tim, who watches him leave the car with that same small, weary, fake smile. For a split second, when Damian looks back as the door swings shut, he sees Tim’s face shift, the facade crumble, but it happens too fast and then the car is driving away.

He stomps up the front steps to school, angry at Tim for hiding things from him, at himself for not knowing how to help, at Bruce and Alfred for letting Tim go on like this. Dick will be able to help, Damian thinks. He needs to call Dick.

 

* * *

 

Tim strains against the arms holding him in place, trying to move closer to Damian, and gets his hair yanked painfully for his trouble. It’s a familiar situation, being surrounded by ninjas. Normally he wouldn’t be too worried. But normally Damian would be at home, safe, not captured alongside him. Ra’s will pay for this.

“Choose, Detective,” Ra’s is telling Bruce, his voice a harsh rasp as decayed as his grey, corpse-like face. “I must have a new body. It must be one of these two.”

Relief floods through Tim. He stops struggling. He knows what to do.

“Me,” he says calmly, lifting his head up high. “I’m the better choice.”

“No!” screams Damian, drowning out Bruce’s own protest. Damian fights tooth and nail against the ninja holding him back as Tim is released and allowed to walk towards Ra’s, desperately trying to free himself to stop Tim, to beat some sense into his older brother.

Tim will gladly deal with Damian’s anger at him later. The only thing that matters to him right now is that, however this day ends, Damian will make it through unscathed. No matter what.

 

* * *

 

Damian has kept himself shut in his room since the funeral, fighting back the tears that burn in his eyes, ignoring the trays of food Alfred leaves outside his door, and taking his emotions out on the furniture. The bedside lamp lays smashed in pieces, and he’s hacked the armchair apart with his katana. 

It’s not enough. He wants to tear down the walls around him, set fire to the rubble, level the entire city, until there is nothing left that reminds of his father. Until his surroundings are as empty and ravaged as his heart.

He lays curled in bed, exhausted but dreading to sleep and have another dream of his father’s corpse, when his door is flung open with a _bang_. He is on his feet immediately, ready to fight. But it’s just Tim. His face is flushed and his eyes are shining with something like joy, or hope. Things Damian doesn’t expect to ever feel again. He assumes that Tim must have lost his mind from the stress.

“Damian, your dad is alive.”

Damian stares at him for a long time. He tries to scoff, to tell Tim that he’s gone mad, to convince himself that he’s still asleep and this is a cruel dream, but Tim’s gaze is clear and sharp, like he’s never been more sure of anything in his life, and Damian can’t look away. He wants to believe it, so, so badly. He does believe it.

It seems he wrote off his ability to hope too quickly.

“You’re certain,” Damian says carefully, trying to reign back his emotions in the face of reason. He saw the body, after all. 

Tim nods. “And I know I can prove it, but I need to leave for a while. Maybe a long time.”

“I can go with you.” He wants nothing more than to leave this haunted mansion and go on a quest to find his father, no matter how long or far, how dangerous, or how doubtful they are to succeed. He knows his father would do the same for him. 

“No,” says Tim, turning him down as gently as possible. Damian tries to protest, and Tim puts a hand on his shoulder. “You have to stay here, with Dick. I need you to keep an eye on him while I’m gone.” Tim frowns regretfully. “He… He doesn’t believe me, about Bruce. He needs you more than I do right now.”

Damian can’t argue. Tim is right. If there is one thing that can stop him from searching the globe for his father, it is being needed by Dick. He suddenly feels ashamed. He’s been so caught up in his own grief and anger, locking himself away from the world, that he hasn’t spared a thought for how his oldest brother is coping.

Dick had knocked on his door several times, but Damian had yelled at him to leave. Where is he now? Down in the cave? Out in the city, recklessly trying to fill the absence Batman has left?

Damian and Tim both know that Dick has committed himself to replacing Bruce as Batman, despite all the times he’s said he never would, despite all the work he’s put into becoming his own hero. He won’t leave Gotham without a Batman. And Batman needs a Robin.

Tim seems to read Damian’s mind. Out of his pocket he pulls the R-shaped shuriken that served as the emblem of his uniform, and places it gently in Damian’s hand.

“He won’t like it,” says Damian.

“I don’t like it either. But none of us can deny that you’re ready. You have more training than any of us did. We can’t stop you.” Tim bites his lip. “Just… be careful out there.”

Damian allows a brief hug as they say goodbye. Tim will be leaving immediately, before he ends up fighting with Dick again. Dick thinks Tim should stay in Gotham and that he needs to see a doctor. He might try to stop Tim from going.

It could be a long time before Damian hears from Tim. He won’t easily be able to send communications while traveling without friends or foes using them to track him down. He isn’t even sure where he’s going yet, apparently. Or maybe he’s just saying that so Damian won’t have to lie.

They’re no strangers to separation. "You're breaking your promise, you know,” Damian tells Tim.

"I know."

Damian shrugs. ”I suppose I'll be able to forgive you once you return, and bring my father with you."

Tim smiles, only a little sadly. ”Take care of things 'til I get back."

Damian looks down at the Robin symbol he holds in his hand, at all the possibilities it represents, then heads down to the cave to let Dick know how things are going to be from now on.


End file.
